RYERSON UNIVERSITY
DEPARTMENT OF FILM PHOGRAPHY AND NEW MEDIA
COURSE OUTLINE WINTER 2001
COURSE CODE AND NAME: NPF 560:
Media Studies: Advanced Topics in Film History and Theory.
Visual Architectonics:
Film as an Integral Whole
PREREQUISITE:
MPF035 FILM THEORY
INSTRUCTOR: PROFESSOR LILY ALEXANDER
E-mail: lily.alexander@utoronto.ca
Office Number: 320
Office hours: Tuesday: 5 p.m. to 6 p.m. and Wednesday: 2.00 p.m. to 4 p.m.
CALENDAR DESCRIPTION:
This segment will survey major theoretical approaches to cinema from formalist and realist
traditions to contemporary developments in the discipline. Students will read classic texts,
view significant films, and be introduced to current critical theory. They will gain knowledge
of the rhetoric, grammar, structure, aesthetics and ideology of cinema, and will acquire a frame
of reference for questioning the inherent belief systems within certain works of film art.
COURSE ORGANIZATION:
This is a 3-hr per week lecture course with segments of seminar and screenings.
What is Visual Architectonics?
The course will explore the notion of visual architectonics and film structure as an integral
whole. A film can be compared to a ship, or a temple. Both require precise and preliminary
calculations, the choice of correct components, and a well-coordinated structure. If a ship
sails, overcoming space, or a temple (building) stands, rising and inspiring others, it is
because their parts and components are well coordinated as an integral whole. An incorrect
unbalanced structure will lead a ship to sink, a temple to fall, and a film to fail—that is to
say, make it unable to affect viewers.
This course will explore visual imagery and structure in the works of outstanding film
directors, focusing on their film as integral wholes. The main goal of the course is to explore
how various levels/aspects of filmmaking are chosen to express the director’s idea, and how
they connect and interact with each other—ultimately, work together—to communicate the
film’s essential message. Balance, coordination and inner structural harmony are crucial to
the content, genre, and form of representation, effectively supporting the story, whether it is a
dramatic, comic, or tragic.
Aspects of film design as a part of visual communication, and their special role in film
structure will be emphasized. The course will also explore the contribution of film’s visual
imagery, composition, space, frame, mis-en-scene, perspective, angles, depth, contrast, color,
texture, rhythm, film, dynamics to the integral totality of the film. The above-mentioned
components of directing will be discussed as aspects of film architectonics, and analyzed
using the most outstanding works in film history. Other structural aspects of filmmaking such
as rising and falling action, dramatic tension, suspense and catharsis, time-space
conceptualization (the dynamization of space and spatialization of time), sound-image
correlation and counterpoint, system of juxtaposition, and types of montage, also will be
explored in connection to film art and directing style.
The first part of the course will introduce students to the main techniques and the
components of film architectonics, its application to film practice, and to research methods.
The most effective integration of visual imagery into the integral whole of a film, into its
system of imagery will be emphasized, as will modes of film analysis and structural analysis
of visual texts and moving images. Students will be required to analyze a single film of their
choice by one of the most outstanding directors, such as Eisenstein, Hitchcock, Welles,
Antonioni, Bertolucci, Pasolini, Tarkovsky, Scorsese, Spielberg, et al. They will examine its
directing techniques and visual strategies from all possible perspectives, demonstrating how
it is structured and proving that it has a highly organized and effectual architectonics. A
presentation will be followed by a group discussion of a given film and of the student’s
preliminary conclusions.
The second part of the course will focus on student research. Screenings, presentations, and
class discussions will explore the most outstanding works of world cinema. The list of topics
and screenings will be compiled during the first two weeks of the course following students’
proposals for individual research projects, and in consultation with the instructor.
There are three assessments during the academic year. Assignments will include:
a) An integral film analysis with a focus on film directing, film form, design, and
architectonics, presented orally (20 min.). A presentation should be preceded by a 2 page
proposal to be discussed with the instructor. It will follow a respective screening and will
be followed by a class discussion; 35%
b) A course paper on the same topic revised and developed (10-12 pages) after a class
discussion; 35%
c) A course journal: a short summary of a student’s conclusions on the most effective
directing techniques in the context of visual architectonics derived from the diverse
practice of great filmmakers, class screenings, lectures, presentations, discussions and
individual film analyses (5 pages). 30%
Course assignments are designed primarily for the students from film program. Students
from visual studies and new media programs will be required to complete all assignments.
However, they may choose to focus on the aspects of cinematography or the potential
applications of film architectonics to the structures of new media text.